Through Dark and Light
by Nerweniel
Summary: The tale of Minerva, of her life and of the two men she is doomed to love. Torn between two lovers... Between good and evil- a life through dark and light. ADMM TRMM.
1. A Human Heart

People think I am quite a prude. Ever-celibate, old, stern McGonagall… They all think they know me.   
  
But they don't.  
  
I have a secret. I have a secret- a terrible secret, but one of which I am secretly a bit proud of. I know it is wrong. I often hate myself for it, but it's the truth and I have never been frightened of the truth.  
  
I, Minerva McGonagall, am the only- I am sure of that- woman who has been, and, if I am not mistaken, still is in both the hearts of the two greatest wizards of this time.   
  
Two wizards, equally powerful, equally strong, but with a very important difference.  
  
One chose the dark side- the other decided to follow the goodness in his heart.  
  
I loved them both.  
  
But why do I use past tense?  
  
I love them both.   
  
I will always love them.  
  
~*~  
  
I have often compared my situation with that of Rowena Ravenclaw, one of those mighty Founders of so long ago. Perhaps she would be the only one capable to understand me. Maybe she would understand it. Maybe she would understand there are feelings to strong for a human heart.  
  
She always intrigued me, that woman, the most beautiful witch of all times, as they say. But there are things more important than her beauty. That's the mistake many writers of all those books I have read about her mostly make.   
  
She was a beauty, yes, but she was also a woman with a heart, a woman… torn between two lovers. Maybe she'd understand me. Maybe she actually would.  
  
Goderic Gryffindor and Salazar Slytherin.  
  
Albus Dumbledore and Tom Riddle.  
  
What is the difference?  
  
~*~  
  
There is no difference.  
  
I have realized that.  
  
There is no difference, and neither is there a solution. Except, perhaps, except to learn to live with it. To build a stern façade around your heart, to hide that ever-aching pain. I have done that. It doesn't solve anything, though. But it's at least a way to live.   
  
A wall to hide behind.   
  
Love hurts.   
  
~*~  
  
Love hurts, yes.  
  
Because who will ever understand a woman who is, after all those past, terrible years, still desperately in love with the man who's murdered so many people whom she loved?  
  
Lily and James, mom and dad, and oh… so many others.   
  
They all stare at me, from wherever they may be, with silent, accusing eyes.   
  
Why do you love him, they ask me, and I answer.  
  
I do not know.  
  
I love Tom Riddle- I have never wanted to call him "Voldemort", for that name was invented when it was already too late for him. When the real Tom had already left.  
  
And I love his greatest enemy as well.   
  
Albus Dumbledore.  
  
~*~  
  
Albus and Tom were… are… so different.   
  
Being in Tom's arms was fire, wild, desperate, and complete. We knew we weren't meant to be forever. We knew we would never marry. We didn't care.  
  
Albus… having Albus' arms around me felt like coming home a bit. So soft and so welcoming. So good. Perhaps we also weren't meant to be. Yet we married.  
  
But that is a long story, the story of my life and loves.  
  
I'll write it down. 


	2. Right From The Start

I met Tom Marvolo Riddle in my 7th year. I was the Head Girl, he was the Head Boy, and thus we were doomed to cooperate, though I remember very clearly I hated it. I, Minerva McGonagall, every inch a Gryffindor, with that sneaky Slytherin? Never, I said, but I had to. And I did.   
  
Actually, I didn't even know him. He was just one-of-those Slytherins for me- I never wanted to know them. The rivalry of so long ago between Godric Gryffindor and Salazar Slytherin has never really parted. Even now, when I see Potter and Malfoy…   
  
It will never go away. Godric and Salazar, Albus and Tom, Harry and Draco …   
  
It is just history repeating itself.   
  
~*~  
  
Yet Tom was different. It's hard to believe, for he was the person who would once become the darkest Lord ever, but he was different. Or perhaps he wasn't. I don't know. Love had blinded me.   
  
But it doesn't blind me anymore now. That blindness isn't permanent- it leaves, even though I desperately tried to keep it.   
  
Yet, I looked up, lifted my head and saw. I have needed all that courage which had made me being sorted into Gryffindor instead of Ravenclaw. I still need it, everyday, when I remember and see all the damage, all the wounds, all the deaths.   
  
~*~  
  
But I started to believe Tom was something else- I saw him once punish a 6th year Slytherin boy who was taller than himself, because the guy was bullying one of the 1st year Gryffindors. The Slytherins despised him for weeks.   
  
I have admired him ever since. He wasn't weak, he wasn't a follower, he didn't go with the flow. He was strong. He was independent.  
  
He was like me.   
  
I wasn't nice with him, actually, I was often just plain rude. Yet, he stayed friendly and always tried to talk to me, about… About the things a Head Girl and Head Boy need to talk about.  
  
It went on for months, and then Christmas came.  
  
And he kissed me.  
  
~*~  
  
Winte Break…   
  
Always a merry period at Hogwarts, but not that particular year. For some reason, everybody was going home for Christmas. Well, not everybody. Rolanda Hooch went away, and Poppy and Sera Sinistra... My friends all went home, but I stayed. My father had died when I was twelve and I and my mum… I loved her because she was my mother, and one has to love one's mother, but I didn't love her as a person. She was so light-hearted, so young… I often had the feeling I was older than she was.   
  
We were just too different.  
  
So I stayed at Hogwarts, the one place I called and still call my one true home. I did like my mother's small cottage in Scotland, where she and my little sister lived, but Christmas at Hogwarts would be… special. It always was.   
  
I did not at all realize how special it would be. 


	3. Ripped Into Two

I spent my days in the library. I have always liked libraries. Quiet, they are, and there are loads of books to lose myself in. Books were, are, wonderful. They can bring you to other planets, make you see other worlds. Give you the opportunity to forget things, just for a while; That's a quality of books I have learned to appreciate very much. Very, very much indeed.  
  
I have always been a down-to-earth person. I have always wanted to know and see the truth, and I have always judged people who did not as cowards.  
  
But sometimes, I am a coward myself.  
  
I am not ashamed for that. Not anymore.  
  
But I am straying off my subject again.  
  
I spent my days in the library, because the Gryffindor Common Room suddenly seemed strangely empty and cold without my friends there. So I sat there, hours a day, at what the librarian called "Minerva's usual spot", between all those large bookcases. Usually, I was almost alone there. It was Winter Break after all- and most of the remaining students sat in their Common Rooms, close to the fire. I didn't care, though. I have never been afraid of a bit of loneliness. Sometimes, I even like it.  
  
And then, one day, he was there.  
  
~*~  
  
I entered the library, greeted Madam Mirthson, the librarian, and was about to sit down when I noticed him. He was sitting at my table. At my very special usual table.   
  
"Riddle, you are sitting on my chair." I, quite sharply, spoke. I admit I was rude, but he was a Slytherin, after all… I know it's not an excuse, but it was my reason.  
  
He looked up- quickly, in what I tended to call "his own sly Slytherin way", then, to my great surprise, stood up and gallantly pulled back my chair for me. I sat down, and I think my eyes quite rudely said something like "Go. Away.".  
  
But he didn't. He asked, very politely, if he could sit down at that table as well.   
  
"Well, Riddle, I can't stop you, so do whatever you want to do!" I snapped, focusing on the book before me, determined not to speak one more word to him.  
  
But, and this is an extremely melodramatic sentence and I am ashamed for it, my heart decided otherwise.   
  
~*~  
  
Tom Riddle actually loved reading as well. He knew things. He liked Transfigurations as well. He was about the only person I'd ever met who had read "Hogwarts, A History", and liked it as well! I don't know how or why, but we started talking and for some reason, we kept on talking. There we were: Slytherin Number One and Gryffindor Number One, sitting at one table, talking and… laughing together. I forgot to snap, I forgot to answer sharply. I forgot spitting fire with my eyes.  
  
There was just him… and me.  
  
~*~  
  
He kissed me right after that first day in the library. We had just left the room, and we both had our arms full of books. I shall never forget that moment when he just dropped them on the stone floor, grabbed my shoulders and wildly kissed me. I did not pull away.   
  
That was the only time I have ever dropped books on the floor.  
  
~*~  
  
I realized I loved him.  
  
I also realized that this was something we had to keep secret.  
  
He agreed.  
  
It was not that we didn't want everybody to know, it was just that we knew that no-one would accept it. Nor the Slytherins, nor the Gryffindors.  
  
And for Heaven's sake, we knew we weren't meant to stay together forever. We knew it.  
  
It was all too desperate, too deep, too intense.   
  
We didn't care, though. 


	4. One For You

So we were in love. We spent the rest of our Winter Break together, mostly sitting on the couch before the fire in the Slytherin Common Room. Tom was the only Slytherin who'd stayed over the holidays, so we had no risk of getting caught. Getting caught, yes, that was how we saw it.  
  
We knew our relationship would never be accepted. By no-one. Even our friends, we knew, would object and regard our love with scolding eyes. It simply could not be. Slytherin and Gryffindor were opposites, enemies even, and enemies could never be bond. Period.  
  
It was all so ridiculous, but the worse part was, that that belief secretly was in our heart as well. But that wonderful two weeks, we didn't care. When my head was on his shoulder and his arm was around me, nothing could harm us.  
  
At least, we thought so.  
  
~*~  
  
But the harm did come. And the most ironic part of it was, that it came from a quite unexpected direction.  
  
Namely me.  
  
Tom, I loved you and love you, and every time I looked into your eyes, I felt my love for you consume my heart, and I know that I'll always love you. Stern, old, rigid Professor McGonagall… consumed by love for the one and only Lord Voldemort? It's almost ridiculous and yet it is the truth.  
  
I loved, love Tom Riddle.  
  
But then Albus came. 


	5. And One For You

Albus came- or, no, that's not true. Albus had been there all along. Professor Dumbledore, Transfigurations Professor, and my favorite teacher since the very first day. That was, of course, quite logical- I had a natural talent for his subject and it had always interested me. But especially in that 7th year. That doomed 7th year, as I sometimes put it, though I also know that it was a blessed 7th year as well.  
  
Because if I had not been through it, I would not be the person I am now.  
  
But do I want to be the person I am now?  
  
And here she sits, Professor McGonagall, notorious know-it-all and always having an answer for all questions. But for the one question that matters, for the question of her life, she doesn't have an answer.  
  
Perhaps there just is no answer.  
  
~*~  
  
The reason for that particular interest in Transfigurations during my 7th year was, I believe, my sudden dream of becoming an Animagus once. I knew they were very rare, and I knew it was advanced magic and I was, of course, very young, but that exactly formed the challenge for me.   
  
I had never known much challenges in school life. Though Transfigurations was obviously my best subject, I was a very good student- I learned very quickly. I still do, for that matter.  
  
But this- this was a challenge. If I managed to transform into an animal before my Graduation, I would be the youngest Animagus ever known of. It was not the fame that attracted me- I've never cared about fame- but it was just… something new.  
  
And Minerva McGonagall has never, never ever in her entire life, denied a challenge.  
  
~*~  
  
So she, I –because it's ridiculous to speak of yourself in the 3nd person-, accepted.  
  
Professor Dumbledore was very supportive. He was more convinced I could do it than I was myself. Because even though I knew I was good –I have never been the person to brag, but some things one does now- things didn't came as quick as I had expected them to come.   
  
Animagus training was hard. Not only because of the high-level magic, but also because of the will-power which was certainly needed. The self-control. The inner strength. And I had, and have, always been a very strong-headed woman, but it is truly disappointing when all Transfigurations you had ever tried just- worked- and suddenly, you met something you couldn't do.  
  
I finally realized how difficult my favorite subject was.  
  
But Professor Dumbledore- Albus, as I grew to call him on all those training nights- supported me. He told my I could do it, and though, after months of work, my self-esteem was not exactly great, his words indeed helped me in a lot of ways.   
  
I think it was then I fell in love with him. 


	6. In Clear Innocence Born

I was in love with two men.  
  
I, Minerva McGonagall- serious, intelligent, boyfriend-less-and-not-caring Minerva McGonagall! It came as a shock to me, but I figured it would even be a greater shock to the people around me, so I did everything I possibly could to prevent them from finding out.   
  
In public, I acted nothing less than rigidly towards Tom- one time, someone even slightly reproached me for being so unfriendly towards him… What a joke…  
  
But when we were together alone- what a strange phrase, by the way, "together alone"...- it was magic. Fire.   
  
I have never known such a strange, sudden and- but that I realized only later- fatal attraction as that between me and Tom. We didn't waste time pondering, thinking, because some part of us already realized, I believe, that it was not meant to be forever.  
  
But whatever. As if we cared. We were young and we were overwhelmed by a feeling too big for us alone. It was so confusing.  
  
I had always lead the life of an angel. I studied, I worked hard, I was serious and strict- even more for myself than for others. Teachers respected me, my fellow students too- though I felt I was sometimes observed as a somewhat… strange creature. My friends called me "exceptional", and that was perhaps meant to be a compliment, yet it does show I was not like the others.  
  
Innocent, I was.   
  
And then, Tom came, and feelings older than us, older than time, wiped my innocence away with the ease of a whirlwind. I still do not entirely understand. How it could happen. How I, intelligent, clear-headed, could fall for someone the way I did for him.  
  
The only reason I can think of is just the one I have never wanted to believe in.  
  
That it was meant to be.   
  
And then there was Albus as well.   
  
He became a friend. A true friend. Our relationship- though not yet a romantic one- went far beyond just teacher-student. We thought the same things, I and Albus, and seeing our age difference of more than forty years, that was in fact nothing short of a miracle.   
  
We often played chess, and while we did so, we talked very much and discussed various things.  
  
I told him of my youth. Of mother and father. Of Maia.  
  
Maia, my sister whom I have never really known.  
  
The story of my life is a sad one.   
  
I was born the daughter of Malcolm and Teresa McGonagall-Wyattson on a cold, snowy December day, long ago. My mother gave birth to me at the McGonagall estate in Scotland- my dad's family was one of the more important Scottish wizarding families- and I spent my whole childhood there as well.  
  
A very happy childhood indeed.  
  
Yet that I really realized only when it already was too late. It usually goes that way, I believe. One can only realize the worth of something when it has been taken away.  
  
My childhood was taken away from me.  
  
But neither my parents nor I myself ever foresaw that. How could we, after all?  
  
I have been an only child for very long indeed- which made me quite the exception in those days- but I never felt it that way. My mother had been just eighteen when she got me, little more than a child herself, and she enjoyed playing games with me as much as I did. Mom was a young, slender Scottish beauty, with, as people always said, emeralds in her eyes and roses on her cheeks… They also said I resembled her, but I never believed a single word of it.  
  
I am not beautiful.  
  
My dad was, though many years my mother's senior, still a tall, handsome man with reddish hair and always-blushing cheeks. He, too, nothing less than showered his only daughter with all attention and loving he could give her, despite the fact he, being an Auror, was often very busy.  
  
I was a very happy child.  
  
True- I hadn't got brothers nor sisters, but I had somehow never missed that as well.  
  
Yet I remember as if it were yesterday when, just before I started my first year at Hogwarts, my mother told my she was pregnant with a little girl. I was absolutely delighted. A little sister… it would make my already complete world even more complete…  
  
Maia would be the little girl's name, Mom and Dad had decided.  
  
It was not meant to.  
  
In March of the next year, the rising Lord Grindelwald paid my parents a visit.   
  
Mom and the unborn baby were killed by one well-cast Avada Kedavra-curse. And somehow, it killed me as well. My dad survived, but within one year, he as well was buried next to mother. Death by grief.  
  
I've read so many times about it, I thought it was impossible, but it isn't.  
  
My Daddy died of grief, and left his little girl alone in this world. I've never blamed him, though. He loved my mother, and as soon as I was a lover myself, I realized I too would die with…  
  
With Tom?  
  
Or with Albus? 


	7. Between Two Lovers Torn

My 7th year passed too quickly- like water through my fingers. I was the top student in my class, a Transfigurations genius. I spent all nights in Albus's classroom- studying and practising, again, and again, and again, until that memorable May night.   
  
For it was in May- the 11th of May, that I, Minerva Héloise McGonagall, became an Animagus.  
  
And Albus Dumbledore's mistress.  
  
My first Transfiguration came very suddenly- I had almost given up my hopes in succeeding before my graduation, but all of a sudden, I was gone, and there stood a small, sliver-grey tabby cat…  
  
I Transfigurated back immediately- and Albus's arms were around me. It was perhaps meant as a friendly hug- probably- to congratulate his star pupil, but our lips found each other and we were locked.  
  
Locked together, melted together, one. Union.  
  
We tried to fight it.  
  
He, because he felt guilty in "seducing" a student. Oh, Albus, my love, how could you have been so naïve? As if Minerva McGonagall ever was a girl to be "seduced"… Still, he felt guilty, I knew. But I, and he, also knew that that did not matter. We were love- we did not feel love, we were love in its purest, most magical form. When his arms encircled me…  
  
But there was also Tom.  
  
For I felt guilty too. Tom, my love, you were the snake where I was a lioness. We were fire- fire and fire bonded together in one flame. And how could I betray you? How could my feelings be so double? How could I love Albus Dumbledore and Tom Riddle- already his greatest opposite by then- with one and the same heart?  
  
But that same heart had been torn long ago.  
=====  
Albus kissed me, Tom kissed me- and I, I, ever-practical, did not know what to do!  
  
Minerva Héloise McGonagall did not know what to do.  
  
I recall I remembered the fate of the woman who had given me her name as my middle name. Héloise, She With The Torn Heart. Héloise.  
  
I had read her story as soon as I was old enough to be able to read.  
  
Héloise- a torn woman. In another way than me, perhaps, but still. She too had loved a man despite she knew better than to love him. Abélard and Héloise. Héloise and Abélard.   
  
Albus and Minerva. Minerva and Albus.  
  
Minerva and Tom. Tom and Minerva.  
=====  
I lived my life, years after Hogwarts- an Auror first, then a Professor. Tom grew darker and darker- I kept visiting him, though. When he held me, he was not Lord Voldemort. At least so I told myself over and over again until I started to believe it.  
  
But through everything, I remained Albus's friend, lover, mistress.  
  
He didn't know about Tom. He knew I visited him. He did not like Tom, but what could he do, after all? I was not his wife- I was not even officially his consort. Marriage had just- never happened between us. For both our safety, probably. Albus had many enemies.  
  
Tom was one of them.  
  
When Albus walked in on us, I proposed to leave him. It was mere selfishness from my side. I agree on that. But still- some part of me still capable of rational thinking realized- or seemed to realize- this was the best for both of us. He was so hurt. I read his eyes, I saw tears sliding down his already wrinkled cheeks. When he reached out for my hand- yes, that noble was he, I turned away.  
  
It ripped my heart apart.  
=====  
And then later on- at the quarters we had secretly shared for almost five years.  
  
I had grabbed my things together and I was standing at the door.   
  
"Stay." he said.  
  
"Stay." he begged.  
  
I turned my back to him and I ran away. I heard him cry. I didn't stop. It hurt so much to leave him. But I had to go.  
  
He called me.  
  
He.  
  
Tom.  
  
**A/N: The story of Héloise**  
  
Héloise was a young French girl who, in the 11th century, fell in love with a famous theologian, Pierre Abélard. He could not marry her- it would have ruined his carrier and her uncle would not approve of it after he had caught them in a rather compromising situation. Eventually, they did marry, but not because they wanted to- just because Héloise was pregnant. Their child was adopted eventually.  
  
To keep their relationship a secret- Héloise became a nun and Abélard became a monk.   
  
Héloise's uncle, who had taken care of her after her parents' death, was very angry because of the "dishonour" of his niece, and hired men to attack Abélard and castrate him. They succeeded, and the relationship of Abélard and Héloise grew platonic. They hardly saw each other again- Abélard had most probably ditched her for his career.   
  
It's a very beautiful, but sad story.  
  
This has not much to do with M. McGonagall's story, but Héloise has become, over the ages, a symbol of true and indestructible love, and isn't that what Minerva Héloise McGonagall is searching for?


	8. Sentence, Doom, Fate

The fairytale with Tom- then already called Lord Voldemort- lasted exactly three months.  
  
After those blissful, but dark three months, he crossed the most important, most forbidden border he could possibly have crossed.  
  
He beat me.   
  
At my mere, casual mentioning of Albus' name, I saw it happen. His eyes. Tom, my sweet, understanding Tom had deep, emerald eyes with an occasional spot of brown. Voldemort, the man who would ruin my life and those of so many others, had black eyes. The black of abyss- of utter, true darkness.  
  
And he beat me.   
  
I don't remember things very clearly anymore- I remember his eyes growing dark and then just the feeling of soft hands turning into steel fists on my skin. I have always been more powerful a witch than Tom Marvolo Riddle, but without wands, it was an uneven fight all the way. He was taller than me and of course physically stronger. His fists hit me harder than I had ever been hit, and though I raised my hands in order to protect myself, it did not help at all. His anger only grew and grew, and- what was even worse than the beating- he yelled at me. That I was a whore. That I was a slut. That he would give me what I deserved.   
  
And I cried. And I begged.   
  
Minerva Héloise McGonagall never begged.  
  
And I gave up.  
  
==========  
  
When I regained consciousness, tears sprung in my already wet eyes and I wondered whether there was one bone in my body he had left unbroken. But somehow, I managed to get up and more on will-power than on physical strength, I ran away from the place Tom- no, Lord Voldemort- called his palace. I ran, and I ran- and I ran.  
  
Every single movement cut straight through my body.  
  
Every single memory cut straight through my heart.  
  
And I don't know where to I ran, or for how long or how I managed to keep running. I just remember, at a certain moment, to be running through a street, past people, and I remember those people's gazes.  
  
Then, I fell.  
  
And I kept falling.  
  
==========  
  
As the deep, grey mist inside of my usually so clear mind started to fade, my own, soft moan filled my ears- and made me startle. My eyelids felt as if they were made of solid steel, but one thing was really strange. Despite a terrible headache, despite the scar my slightly shaking hand felt across my cheek, I did not feel any pain.  
  
Someone must have- healed me, I realized and all of a sudden, my eyelids did flutter open as my hand powerlessly fell back on the soft, cotton sheets that covered my body.  
  
The first thing- person- they noticed, was a sitting, sleeping figure, his mouth hidden beside an auburn-grey beard, but his eyes red, swollen and obviously stained with tears.  
  
Oh, Albus…  
  
"A-A…" I did not get any further than the first vowel of his name.   
  
It was enough anyway.   
  
"Minerva!"   
  
The next thing I knew were his soft arms around me- and his and my tears mingling on our cheeks.   
  
"Minerva, I thought I'd lose you… Minerva…" came out his soft, almost broken voice as his hand rested on my wet cheek. His own eyesight was blurred in tears as well, but there was no bitterness among the radiating blue.  
  
Only love.  
  
Albus was an angel.   
  
Albus is an angel.  
  
He held me tight, hugged me and kissed me at the same time, and I smiled against his lips as his hands carefully, as if I could break into pieces every single moment, cupped the back of my head.  
  
"I love you, Minerva."  
  
And for the first time, for the very, very first time, my blindness was taken away and I saw.  
  
I saw my sentence.  
  
I saw my doom.  
  
I saw my faith.  
  
And I knew I could honestly answer  
  
"I love you too, Albus."  
  
And I love Tom as well. 


End file.
